The present invention relates to a cooling apparatus for performing rapid cooling or freezing of food products.
There has so far been proposed a cooling apparatus as shown in FIG. 1. In FIG. 1, reference numerals 1 designate food products such as grated meat to be frozen; numerals 2 designate pieces of frozen bread each of which contains the grated meat; numerals 3 designate vertically arranged cooling vessels between which pieces of the frozen bread are put. Each of the cooling vessels 3 is connected at one side to an inlet tube 5 through a flexible tube 4 and is connected at other side to an outlet tube 6 through another flexible tube 4 so that a low temperature cooling fluid 9 flows therethrough without leakage. A loading device 8 is provided on the uppermost cooling vessel 3 to press the pieces of frozen bread 2 between the vertically arranged cooling vessels 3 and a fixed floor 7 so that the food products 2 to be frozen can be effectively cooled by the cooling fluid 9 from the top and the bottom.
The operations of the conventional cooling apparatus will be described.
Pieces of frozen bread 2 filled with food product to be frozen 1 are put between the low temperature cooling vessels 3 by manual operations. Then, the loading device 8 is actuated so that the flexible tubes 4 are deformed to press the frozen bread 2 toward the fixed floor 7 via the cooling vessels 3. Thereafter, the low temperature cooling fluid 9 is fed by a fluid supplier (not shown) to pass through the inlet tube 5, the cooling vessels 3 and an outlet tube 6 in order thereby to cool the food products to be frozen 1. As soon as cooling is completed, the loading operation of the cooling vessels is released and the pieces of frozen bread are taken out by manual operations. And then, the frozen food products 1 is removed from the frozen bread 2 by using a heating device (not shown) to pass the frozen food products to the next step.
The conventional cooling apparatus having the construction as above-mentioned has the following disadvantages:
(1) When the pieces of frozen bread 2 are put in and taken out of the cooling apparatus, much labour is needed.
(2) Since the pieces of frozen bread 2 are put in the cooling apparatus in multistage, there is a great pressure difference between the bread at the upper portion and the bread at the lower portion. Accordingly, for the purpose of preventing deformation of the frozen food products, it is necessary to use the frozen bread having high rigidity. The highly rigid frozen bread constitute thermal resistance whereby cooling performance at the lower surface is inferior.